Guest

Peter Corbett

"Technology Tribe Leader"

For Peter Corbett, a leader in the new technology community in Washington, DC, relationship-building is a full-time job. "Bringing people together is what I think about every day," says Corbett, the founder of iStrategy Labs, a digital marketing firm and the engine behind the Twin Tech, a series of regional events that bring together the creatives and techies of the information technology world for networking and business development. "My job as a leader is to feed technologists what they need and get them involved where they need to be involved. "

A case in point is iStrategy's recent Apps for Democracy project for the District of Columbia government. Nominated for a UN Public Service Award, the project sourced innovation directly from talented citizen coders. The result was the development of 47 new applications, from an iPhone app that sounds an alert if you are in a dangerous neighborhood, to an app that tracks government spending and allows you to make comments. "The government valued these apps at 2.6 million, had they been acquired through the established Request for Proposal model, says Corbett. "It's all of our jobs to contribute to democracy. We wanted to change the way government procures IT. This is a crowd source application development model we're pioneering, and now, cities like Toronto and New York are looking at it."

Traveling to Helsinki, Corbett looks forward to meeting the brands that are developing technology-driven marketing and to connecting with Helsinki's IT community for cross-collaboration. "I'll be looking for a Finnish Ambassador for the Government 2.0 Club, a global chapter-based organization helping governments understand how new technologies can benefit citizens."

Host

Jarmo Eskelinen

Executive Director, Forum Virium Helsinki

Helena Hyvärinen

Executive Producer, Forum Virium Helsinki

Forum Virium Helsinki is ready to show Mr Corbett the digital delights of Helsinki.

We are specialists in this field, as Forum Virium Helsinki promotes the development of digital services in the Helsinki metropolitan area.

We are an independent co-operation cluster, bringing together ideas and content creators with high-growth and established companies as well as public sector organisations. Forum Virium Helsinki leads development projects and opens contacts to international markets in addition to playing a key role in creating Living Lab test environments.

Mr Corbett's visit will be hosted by Mr Jarmo Eskelinen, Executive Director of Forum Virium Helsinki and Ms Helena Hyvärinen, Executive Producer, Media Project Area.We have prepared an interesting programme for Mr Corbett's visit. He will be introduced to the technical, innovative and creative side of Helsinki - not forgetting the phenomena of social media.

4) Tavastia Club: If you like music you have to go to the world's longest standing rock and roll club. Make sure you check out the semi-final stage where emerging artists get their first chance to show off their stuff.

5) Stockmann Department Store: It turns out that during my visit it was "crazy days" at Helsinki's largest department store, which mean everyone was in a buying frenzy. The I explored 6 floors of Finnish goods - I'm sure you'll find something you like!

Journal by Peter Corbett

Journal of Peter Corbett on March 29

My journey to Helsinki has not officially begun, but I've been talking about it with a number of people over the past few weeks. One of the things I plan to do is to shoot a short documentary - and I'm still refining the concept for it. Once I have a definitive directly I'll post more about that here.

Journal of Peter Corbett on March 31

Last minute schedule: Having a great client call at 10:30 to talk about a digital + experiential marketing campaign on college campuses, photo shoot for Washingtonian Magazine at 11, interview on Fed News Radio at 1pm, head to the airport at 2pm, fly to Helsinki at 5pm!

31 March 09

Journal of Peter Corbett on April 2

Yesterday was a tough one as I landed with about an hour of sleep and jumped right into agenda planning and a couple meetings.

I'm glad I didn't opt to just run to my hotel room to sleep because my meetings with www.zipipop.com and www.tripsay.com were terrific!

Today is going to be a full day and you can follow most of what I'm doing via http://www.twitter.com/corbett3000 in real time :)

2 April 09

Journal of Peter Corbett on April 4

I'm at the http://www.mediapaivat.fi/english/ conference and I'll be speaking about Apps for Democracy and Citizen Driven Innovation at 2pm.

4 April 09

Journal of Peter Corbett on April 2

I landed yesterday and there was an article about my work in Helsingin Sanomat: http://tinyurl.com/c8qql4

4 April 09

Journal of Peter Corbett on April 3

Forum Virium has been such a incredible host and have setup some really interesting meeting for me thus far. I've visited the following companies:

http://www.tripsay.com/index.html (Great insight into the local tech community in Helsinki. Looks like Helsinki has good sources for early strange funding, but the tech community isn't as tightly coalesced as DC. DC on the other hand has very few sources for early stage investments).

http://www.demos.fi/english (These guys are a think tank + culture hacking group that I think feels and thinks a lot like iStrategyLabs).

www.kuubi.fi (also really felt like iStrategyLabs but with a deeper focus on content creation - they do all the film trailers in Finland for big Hollywood films, where as iStrategyLabs is more heavily weighted on the social media marketing side...though Kuubi is quiet adept at that as well). They made a really cool touch screen interface to pop bubbles with!

Went to http://2009.pixelache.ac/ today which was interesting - I stood up and told a very left leaning socialist that capitalism is the best system but that it needs to be tweaks A LOT to work better for people.

http://www.sulake.com/ was certainly a very enlightening company to visit. They've really tapped the pulse of the youth market in a big way with http://www.habbo.com/

Off to meet the Mayor now!

4 April 09

Journal of Peter Corbett on April 6

Yesterday I spoke at a conference on "Citizen Driven Innovation" and my slides are here: